Kid Photographed Taking a Dump on Chinese Subway, Goes Viral (the photo, not the poop)

There must be something in the water in Asia this week. No sooner had we heard the story of a man caught urinating on a political campaign poster in Osaka than a photo emerges of a boy doing a number two in a busy train in China…

The photo was posted online on Saturday evening by a Chinese internet user along with a message saying that he had witnessed the kid taking a “huge” dump on the crowded train.

The image has, understandably, caused quite a ruckus online, and was even picked up by the Chinese media, with people condemning the act as everything from “shameful” to “vomit-inducing”…

Although we (thankfully!) can’t see the chop that the kid is supposedly dropping in the above image, the comments the user makes along with his photo, as well as the fact that the kid is holding tissue paper and clearly has his pants pulled down, lead us to believe that this may be the real deal.

“I couldn’t believe what I saw today;” the uploader comments, “I was taking the number three train through Guangzhou (Canton) when I noticed this kid taking a dump in the corner next to the doors. And what’s more it was huge! The kid’s father was standing right beside him watching him do it.”

As disgusting as that sounds, we’d be tempted to document an event as shocking as this, too…

During a trip to Beijing a couple of years ago, I must admit that I was surprised at how many times I witnessed people either spitting in the street or answering the call of nature barely feet from where crowds of people were walking. A friend also told me that she once observed a young mother stand and watch proudly as her infant son crouched down in the middle of a city street and dropped a load, rather than taking him to a bathroom or side-street. Until seeing this photo, I never quite believe that it could be true, but now I’m not so sure…

But before we write China off based on the actions of a few poorly educated individuals, let’s take a quick look at some of the comments made by Chinese internet users in response to the photograph:

“Have these people no sense of shame!?”

“Sorry, is this kid from the past?? Who does something like this??”

“What kind of parent allows their child to do this?”

“How hard is it to hold on just a little while longer!?”

“What is happening to this country!?”

“Look at how big that kid is! I can’t believe he’s doing that!”

We couldn’t agree with the last comment more; had it not been for the comments accompanying the photograph, we could have sworn that we were looking at a young adult, here, rather than a child. Sure, little kids are sometimes caught short and often have the uncanny ability to wait until the train doors close or a car joins the freeway before telling their parents that they need to go to the toilet, but this kid can’t be under eight or nine years old at the very least…

The uploader of the photograph asserts that- aside from the fact that the kid was dropping anchor in public, of course- the father and his pooping prodigy looked like a perfectly respectable middle-class family.

Lesson learned: the next time you’re riding a train and a seemingly respectable person crouches down to take something out of their bag, keep a close eye on them…

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